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Honorée Jeffers is a major figure in American letters. I met her when she was appointed “Witter Bynner Fellow” at the Library of Congress by US Poet Laureate Natasha Trethewey. It was love at first sight. She is a true southern lady with reverence to the South’s most elegant traditions. At the same time she is a powerful transformer and reformer of its present and past. She changes sorrow into compassion with a huge story at the center of every poem. She is as free as the wind, and cannot be caught by any net. This refreshes our language, making it new. - Grace Cavalieri

I met Sue Silver in West Virginia when she was poeting around the Charlestown area. She brought white sage into my workshop to "smudge" each of the writers and to cleanse our creative scene. It was then I knew she was a poet for me to know. Now, in a temporary medical residency in Annapolis, she is tasting of the Annapolis/ DC poetry world and finding the area indispensable. When she settled in, all the foxes jumped out of their lairs, the rabbits from their holes, the fish from the sea to greet her, for she's a healing energy among us. And her poetry is too. - Grace Cavalieri

Alan King is a credit to poetry and to the DC community. He speaks truth with lyrical beauty; and his life is lived exactly so. He reaches beyond poetry to surround the field with good will. What art does not need that spiritual assistance? His own work is clear and clean, no high fat content . He means what he says and says what he means, with emotional velocity and a sense of adventure. Alan's purpose is to make poetry redefine itself, and rectify our lives. - Grace Cavalieri

I met Avideh Shashaani in the mid 1980's when she was translating poetry from Perisan to English. She was a poet herself and able to transform ancient work into silky language. But she had other Persian documents that had been rendered to flat (literal) translations. She was looking for some DC poets to turn them to "poetry." I was a program officer at National Endowment for the Humanities; producing radio or WPFW; and running a small press, with daily appearances at home as wife and mother. I said No. But I would provide her with others: Robert Sargent, Ann Darr, etc. Avideh had been listening to "The Poet and the Poem" on-air and decided I was the one for her. I said NO thank you again. One day I came down the steps in "The Pavilion at The Old Post Office" for lunch and there at the bottom of the steps was AVIDEH with a sheaf of papers under her arms. My life has been blessed with goodness and love ever since. -Grace Cavalieri

David Bristol has been a favorite of mine ever since I met him in 1974. He attended a writing workshop I set up at Glen Echo Amusement Park when the Park was being transformed from an entertainment center to a place of TRUE amusement and entertainment of the highest locution— the Arts. David was alive with words .As a lawyer he knows how to use them; but I’m certain that the School of Law never trained him in such wicked humor, wryness, irony and wisdom. That comes from a more interesting source. So we’re happy to share DAVID BRISTOL’s work. - Grace Cavalieri

Ann Bracken is the consummate artist. She is a poet, visual artist, and the most creative teacher you will ever find. She brings the arts together wherever she walks; and whether writing a book of poems, or designing and sewing a new fashion, it is all the same. The muses fly around her chanting and chanting, go on, go on. We believe in you. And so we present poems because we believe in her too. -Grace Cavalieri

Remica Bingham is sweet and smart. She is funny and serious. She is a professor, wife, mother and a radiant presence in the world of poetry. I do not know anyone who does not love Remica and her poetry. We were sisters in Atlantis with another friend ( Honoree ) but that is private. She drove from Norfolk to DC and back in one day to lift the world of public radio to a new height. Dan Murano and I are so happy with her work and her kindness to the world, that we wanted to share her. - Grace Cavalieri

Peter Dan Levin was known as Dan to his friends. When he became a theater professional, the name Daniel Levin was already used in equity; and so “Peter” was added. What a rich career. I saw him in summer stock in New Hope PA.; I saw him on Broadway in “The Diary of Ann Frank;” and I visited a hardware store in NYC as one of the launching sites for the off broadway movement of the 1960’s. It’s thrilling to have a lifelong friendship with an artist of such energy and intelligence. He also turns his creativity to the page, imagining and crafting poetry. I forgot to say Dan was in kindergarten with me in Gregory School, but even if by some accident he’d been in the other kindergarten classroom, I’d love and admire this work we present today. He’s been telling stories his whole life, on stage, screen and in poems. - Grace Cavalieri

Lahna Diskin was a born poet. We discovered Edna St. Vincent Millay together when we were girls and sang her songs aloud throughout high school and college years. We knew her poems by heart. I think Edna has found her equal in Lahna's lyricism, intelligence, craft and soul. A lifelong friend to poetry, and teaching, Lahna shares her gifts now here with us. -- Grace Cavalieri

Maria lives in an arena of greenery and animals. And from that comes a life of editing and writing. Her new tee-shirt says "STAY CLAM AND PROOFREAD." We're glad she proofed these poems to begin our New Year. We hope 2014 will be as inspired and prismatic as Maria's work - thought without error. - Grace Cavalieri